Louis C.K.’s lesson for marketers: Honesty is the best strategy

Comedian Louis C.K. recently self-released a video of his stand-up special, “Live at the Beacon Theater,” for $5 online. He personally paid for the production costs up front in an experiment to see if this was a cheaper, more efficient, and less restrictive method of getting his content to his fans. In doing so, he cut out paying the middlemen — including the marketingteam — and avoided the red tape of working with studio executives.

“I would have been paid [less than $200,000] by a large company to simply perform the show and let them sell it to you, but they would have charged you about $20 for the video … This way, you only paid $5, you can use the video any way you want.”

Coming from the online marketing world of The Search Agency, I was particularly interested in how he was able to reap a significant ROI without using any of the traditional or online marketing efforts usually made on behalf of comedians and entertainers. Google “Jerry Seinfeld” or “Jay Leno” and you’ll see the paid AdWords links.

Instead, Louis C.K. announced the release of the special on his website and followed up with a personal plea from his Twitter account: “Please don’t torrent this video. I paid for the whole thing with my own stupid money.” He also participated in a Reddit Q&A session with his fans and he discussed his video on “Fresh Air” on NPR. He didn’t appear on Letterman or Leno, he didn’t do an interview with the New York Times. He didn’t do any of the more traditional publicity executed by the PR and marketing teams in the lead-up to a big media product release.

He let his fans do all of the PR.

An alternative comedian, Louis C.K. does not have a PR team or community manager to manage social media assets. He claims to have little knowledge of social media. He told Conan O’Brien that he “hates Twitter.” There is no official Louis C.K. Facebook page, and he personally manages and occasionally engages his 897,707 Twitter followers. At the end of the day, Louis C.K. followed the most basic best practices of social media and promotions outreach and reaped all the benefits of a best-case scenario.

Let me reiterate something — Louis C.K. is not terribly famous. He doesn’t have a built-in fan base that will buy anything he tweets. He has been a successful writer behind the scenes, but has not had enough onscreen time to earn mainstream fame. His TV show “Louie” on FX was very quietly nominated for two Emmys in 2011, but the show’s highest viewership in history was recorded at 1.57 million viewers. This is just a fraction of reigning comedy The Big Bang Theory’s lowestrating of 7.34 million viewers. Even reruns of The Big Bang Theory on cable syndication regularly defeat Louie — just last week 4.3 million viewers turned in to TBS to watch a rerun.

Without the luxury of stardom, Louis C.K. sold $1 million of video downloads by trusting his audience. He showed this by selling DRM-free videos, then gently asking them to purchase, not pirate. This openness built a relationship of mutual trust and respect with his fans. Companies looking to create successful online marketing campaigns should try to build similarly long-term relationships with customers based on trust and direct communication.

All this success happened in the middle of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill controversy. Louis C.K. promoted his own video and demonstrated innovative entrepreneurship without losing significant revenue to Internet piracy. And he did this without any legislative digital protection, proving that making original content available, convenient, and reasonably priced can be enough to quell illegal downloads. Louis C.K. said on his website that “if anybody stole it, it wasn’t many of you. Pretty much everybody bought it.” Perhaps the burden should fall on companies to create products that appeal to willing buyers instead of asking legislators for protection.

Here is my list of lessons from the success of Louis C.K.’s self-released video:

Build relationships with customers using an approach that is engaging, personal, and honest.

Work toward long-term relationships with your customers so that they will trust your brand as long as you deliver high quality content and products.

Create a reasonable price. When the price point is attainable, both fans and people on the fence are willing to pay for the product rather than hunt for a pirated version.

The thing is — Louis C.K.’s online marketing campaign wasn’t really a campaign. It was a public agreement that he made with his audience. He promised to create and release an honest product, and the audience promised to continue supporting his future projects. The consumers didn’t just buy a DRM-free download of Louis C.K.’s standup special — they bought into a trusted relationship with the comedian.

Jessica Lee is a SEO specialist with The Search Agency, an established search marketing firm with expertise in search, display and social media.